Louis Anquetin arrived in Paris in 1882 and studied in two academic ateliers before settling in with a group of friends that included Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Vincent van Gogh and Émile Bernard. These friendships had a great influence on Anquetin’s artistic development; in partnership with Bernard, he developed a style known as Cloisonnisme, which is characterized by the use of emphatic black outlines and unmodulated planes of color that resemble stained-glass windows or medieval enamels. Anquetin’s comfort with both avant-garde and academic styles is evident in this portrait of an unknown man, which combines a cloissoniste contour line with meticulous attention to the sitter’s facial features and clothing, each delicate wrinkle, strand of hair, and crease in fabric carefully articulated.